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The Museum’s Collections document the fate of Holocaust victims, survivors, rescuers, liberators, and others through artifacts, documents, photos, films, books, personal stories, and more. Search below to view digital records and find material that you can access at our library and at the Shapell Center.

The Jewish population of Dej was around 3,500 before the beginning of the war. Following the German occupation of Hungary on March 19, 1944, the Jews of Dej were forced to move to a ghetto situated in a picnic area on the outskirts of the city. Until their deportation to Auschwitz four weeks later, many Jews were tortured and killed, and later buried within the ghetto. After the end of the war, survivors from Dej, mostly former labor servicemen, exhumed the bodies and reinterred them in the local Jewish cemetery with the aid of the authorities. Forensic tests were conducted on some of the bodies in preparation for impending war crimes trials. Several perpetrators of the killings, including Jozsef Gecse and Margit Fekete, were arrested, forced to participate in the exhumation of the bodies, and sent to trial.

Learn about over 1,000 camps and ghettos in Volume I and II of this encyclopedia, which are available as a free PDF download. This reference provides text, photographs, charts, maps, and extensive indexes.